I got back from Hawaii Wednesday night.
My advice to anyone flying from Kona to the East Coast of the US… is to NOT work a full day on Tuesday, then travel a total of 19 hours on 3 flights through 4 airports … with 2 of those flights being over 5 hours.
Do one or do the other. But don’t do both.
I’m just saying.
Next time, I think I’ll stay over in Seattle or San Fran for a few days.
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Never mind.
The travel did not diminish my three weeks hanging out with Han, one of my most favourite human beings of all time, and his lovely wife Marta, at their resort house in la la land Big Island paradise.
What a treat and what a gift.
I have never seen so many consecutive sunrises in my life. All stunning.
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Then came Friday.
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68 days after strangers yelled for me to get out of a burning house, my salvageable stuff was moved to my new rental yesterday.
Thrown out were 2 sofas, my mattresses and 3 large area rugs.
All too smoke damaged, the movers kindly (for a fee) disposed of those things so I didn’t have to bring them with me.
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It took two awesome dudes and about 5 hours to move me 15 minutes down the road.
I learned that everything I own can be summed up to 11 pieces of furniture and 40 medium sized boxes.
In the minimalist version of myself, I had that number being 5 pieces of furniture and 10 boxes.
Eh, go figure. I’m not as lighten as I had presumed.
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Prior to going to Hawaii and now that I am back, I continue to have mixed feelings about being in this new place.
On the one hand, I am happy to be away from that street corner and that four way stop intersection and its daily near car crash misses.
I know not why, but people barrel through that 25mph neighbourhood and ignore or not see the red STOP signs.
A rough guess, I’d say that a police-presence accident happened there at least once every two months, with about 7 near misses occurring every day. Three times, cars ended up on my lawn, nearly hitting the side of the house.
So, goodbye crazy drivers. I will not miss you one bit.
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Another happy reason to leave is that I am not front and centre anymore to every person who walks by.
And we’re talking dozens of people … and their dogs.
Now, I am in no way opposed to saying hello to people. But after a while I just wanted to open my front door to the screen porch, and not have it be an invitation for a chat.
No joke, I used to daydream about installing a nice wooden fence around the property, about 10 feet high, so I could be outside and not be outside with people.
A wall. I had thoughts about constructing a wall. Really? That type of dreaming is so not healthy.
Goodbye waves of foot traffic. I plan not to miss you either.
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One more happy is that I now done with fire damage, smoke damage, and this fire saga.
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The flip side to this move is simple.
I didn’t plan it.
I didn’t want it this year.
I didn’t want it to be in the same town.
I didn’t want a place that is so, well, suburban.
Any questions?
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And here I sit with this current ying/yang emotional state.
To my credit, I think my negatives have loads of merit.
However, they are getting in my way.
Which means, at some point soon (and I mean like tomorrow) I am going to get past all those DID NOTS … unfold my petulant teenaged arms … and embrace what is to be my next 11 more months.
Also, I’ll be in England in about 9 weeks, which gives me plenty of time to de-cardboard this place and add some much-needed shui to this feng.
Oh, this is sounding more and more like a much better state of mind.
Yep. I do believe I am about to embark on what is termed finding your inner Mahalo.
Happy Saturday.